Bard/Strategy
Gameplay is League’s first support to gain advantages solely from moving around Summoner’s Rift. By constantly collecting his unique , he covers plenty of ground at all stages of a game, and offers his team both solid sustain with his and unrivaled team mobility with his long range . Bard, the Wandering Caretaker, revealed ;Laning Even if he is a wandering spirit, Bard first has to identify the best windows of opportunity to roam before he runs off - he can't just abandon his marksman whenever he pleases. By making runs when his lane’s pushed or when his marksman has ed, Bard can successfully roam without placing his teammate in imminent danger, then return to lane by the time he’s needed. And while Bard roams around collecting his chimes, he has plenty of tools to support his allies. Laying down a or two near friendly turrets gives Bard’s teammates the sustain to recover lanes that are losing, or overwhelm ones that are winning, and all without the Wandering Caretaker staying in lane. Bard’s s cover long distances in specific locations, too, gifting friendly fighters and tanks quick access to the enemy team’s jungle, and mages easy access to their own . The portals needn’t propel just Bard and his pals through the jungle, though - coordinating them with allied movement means Bard can quickly move his damage-dealing allies into lane ganks and toward objective control. That said, is best used when his enemies are both seen and distant - they serve little use when enemy assassins simply follow Bard through the portal before claiming lives. Bard offers more than pure sustain and mobility, though, and fires out solid poke whenever he’s in lane thanks to . Though it deals meaningful damage on its own, the slow (and if procced, stun) give Bard surprising ganking potential, particularly when used in conjunction with . Enemies will have to think twice about escaping through the bottom and top lane brush when Bard can pin them to the nearby wall with a well-placed . Once Bard hits six, he gains countless opportunities to secure and protect objectives across Summoner’s Rift thanks to the incredible versatility of . If the enemy team’s tower diving a stranded ally, casting the ability over them grants them a few precious seconds of invulnerability while Bard’s team comes to the rescue. The ability has offensive uses, too, like freezing a lone enemy while Bard’s team closes in for the kill, or freezing an enemy turret while Bard and his allies get to work on diving their suddenly unprotected targets. ;Teamfights The Wandering Caretaker has plenty of ways to control areas of the map come mid game. Even if his team arrives late to a attempt, Bard can cast over the dragon before creating a into the beast’s pit. Suddenly what seemed like a simple dragon kill turns into a contested and a full-scale teamfight. Here, Bard’s role changes to backline utility support. By planting a few around his team’s objective, he gives his team an automatic sustain advantage - allowing becomes increasingly useful in tight areas, too - without large spaces to escape to, it’s much more likely to tether against a nearby wall or second enemy, stunning both units while Bard’s team secure valuable kills. Provided he’s collected enough of the chimes through the course of the game, even Bard’s offer solid utility, slowing and damaging fleeing enemies once the fight is over. Finally, offers Bard the chance to bring copious amounts of mischief to Summoner’s Rift. Baiting the enemy team into following him through a portal before stunning them with can bring about a quick and brutal ace, or drag them out of position, letting Bard sacrifice himself as his team emerges elsewhere from the fog of war to tear the enemy’s defenses apart. ;Synergy Skill Usage * strength as a support comes from the average sustain of , team mobility provided by and the immense utility of and . * lasts for about ten minutes so don't greedily collect them. Collect them when you are sure that the enemy bot lane has recalled or when your marksman pushed the lane and decided to recall. **Better yet collect them when you're walking around while setting up wards. *Have a clear route when collecting so you chain the movement speed it gives. Since it stacks up to five times, it can help you return to your lane faster. **Use to help you return to lane even faster. * can extend its range to stun an enemy champion hiding behind a minion. ** Following it up with your marksman's poke, like or , provides lane pressure. *Leaving all three near the camps where your jungler is starting provides him sustain. This can be used as an advantage if your jungler wants to do an early gank. * has one of the most flexible healing ability in the game. Although states, can have up to 3 shrines active at once, can actually create a fourth by simply using the ability on a team member, which will instantly activate the without it charging. This will not cancel the oldest that already exists. **With this possibility, can leave up to three s around the map, (or bot lane if one chooses to aid the Attack Damage Carry) and activate the forth on himself to utilise the movement speed, which helps move around the map even faster. *Place on spots where the enemy will be having a hard time destroying it. **Placing it behind towers during laning phase is a good idea. **Placing it preemptively behind your team before team fights is also a good idea. **Placing it in places where the enemy does not have vision like brushes or behind walls it's a riskier strategy but it has its own rewards. * can be self cast or cast directly under a teammate. This provides an instant 50% speed boost even at rank one, with no items. * can give mobility to junglers with no gap closers by using it to ambush a lane. **Furthermore, it can save their gap closers to finish a kill should the enemy use their Flash. * can be used as a gap closer to enter a fight or as an escape mechanism to withdraw from a losing one. *Keep in mind that there is juke potential in . could potentially craft a long tunnel, not click on it, and send his anticipating, overhasty opponent traveling down the way, without clicking on the portal himself. Likewise, a tunnel can be set up towards the blue buff to distract the approaching enemy team, buying a couple more seconds to safely finish Dragon. * If you position the path to run down the length of the jungle wall next to a turret, can be used to get behind an opponent as they try to retreat behind their turret to escape a gank, letting you finish them off from behind. * is essentially a dead skill for the first two levels, but once has his and he can either opt to rank up another ability or obtain the portal at level 3 to do a sudden gank on the enemy team while warding the river. * will require a fair amount of time to get the hang of, in terms of aiming the skill, as well as having a philosophy of using it in an advantageous manner to your team. As a general rule, think of it as a momentary disruption to whatever it hits. Keep in mind that this disruption can work against you if it gives your enemies more time to approach, and it can likewise work for you as a gap closer upon enemies you are catching out. A poor use of is to disrupt your own allies as they burst down your enemies, with an ultimate like Wukong's or Katarina's. A good use of would be splitting the enemy team in two, essentially giving you two 5v2 and 5v3 fights, as opposed to one 5v5. Keep in mind that certain champions, with flash-like dodges, will be more evasive to the skill itself, and that, for precision, can be aimed at walls and even the borders of the rift, a useful fact to know when you want to target a turret and nothing by it. * Bard has several unofficial combos during combat, like any other champion would. *# on a retreating enemy faction, allowing your team time to get into position for a fight, followed by as soon as the stasis ends, to stun two of the victims in place and hopefully set up an advantageous team fight. *# through a wall decently long enough to establish an emergence on the other side before your opponent, followed by a targeted against the end of the portal, stunning opponents as they emerge. This is particularly deadly if the end of the tunnel is under a turret, or by waiting carries. *# to speed himself, to slow an opponent in front of him, followed by frenzied auto attacks, to kite. * is one with the highest utility in the game. Its uses include: *#Preventing an ally's death from an incoming spell like . *#Disabling an enemy turret to allow a clean tower dive. *#Casting it on an objective (e.g. ally turret, dragon) can give time to the team to reach the objective to defend/contest. *#Holding off the enemy team while finishing an objective such as dragon or baron. *#Holding off the enemy team while dealing with a flank or an initiator who has gone ahead of his team. *#Catching an enemy to give your team time to get to the champion and kill him. Item Usage * is Bard's most efficient starting item. Additional gold generation early, when Bard is at his weakest, and a empowered basic attack procs two stacks of tribute while also increasing your damage output. **It provides additional gold even when roaming compared to . **Also the slow from its upgrade, , is useful to line up a stun from . *Movement speed is vital on as his entire kit revolves around being able to roam and maneuver around his enemies to stun with . ** are the best boots for roaming. ** can add a bit of damage to your team fighting. ** is a much more effective item than in terms of positioning within a fight. Due to the movement speed active for the entire team, it allows them to swiftly react to a well placed . * provides wards to see incoming ganks especially when you leave your lane to collect . Vision is very important for Bard, being essential for safe roaming, as well as providing information for when good uses are possible. *As with other supports, Cooldown Reduction is a required stat to have on . Not only does and benefit only from cooldown reduction, the ability to use and more gives the presence he needs at a standstill. ** covers your mana problem after placing a or two (maybe even three). also provides CC Removal and grants a heal to allow allies to escape enemy catches. **In situations where roaming is gated by constant pressure from the enemies, is great for its strong early Cooldown Reduction. *Since Bard can already disable turrets with his ultimate, an could be a very useful item, as both combined disable the enemy turret for a very long time and leave an enemy lane defenseless against ganks or aggressive tower dives. *Due roaming nature, he can serve as a powerful splitpusher due to his ability disable enemies from afar and use to flee a bad situation. The various splitpushing items also offers a method for to increase his gold income. ** is a very useful item for who is having a troublesome lane. With the movement speed gained while near turrets, this allows to quickly return to lane and readily juke skillshots on top of pushing the minion wave away. ** is a powerful use-and-forget item that allows an entire lane to push into a monster wave. This is particularly useful if teamfights occur frequently as can stick to his team while pushing another lane entirely. If an enemy leaves to push the other lane back, this may open up an opportunity for to initiate a teamfight. *It is possible to build as an AP Support. However, it requires that he gets items with AP ratios as his base ones are not strong enough to merit getting AP items alone. AP Bard is so that he becomes a lane bully as the strength of his increases alongside his damaging abilities. can easily harass enemies with his and will continue to increase his damage output as he collects . ** is a mandatory item to get on AP . Due to roaming nature, it is quite simple for him to achieve full stacks on . Due to procing spell effects, is able to activate by simply autoattacking with a . Combined with the AOE from , offers significant wave clear in the mid-late game. ** is an option for as all the stats given by it is useful for him. Despite having mediocre cooldowns, can potentially net more damage than in a duel due to the higher AP ratio and the ability to proc quicker. **While offers supreme cooldown reduction, it is not a useful item on . While attack speed does help throw his quicker, has no synergy with attack speed when he has no left. also doesn't offer movement speed like and does. Due to ability to get cooldown reduction through other means, remains a subpar item for . Recommended Items Countering *Remember that or his allies are still targetable while using . This means that champions with pulls such as can use to pull the target away from the portal. **However, if timed incorrectly such as pulling and going into a portal, it could save the target and result with one less kill. *During the laning phase, only has and one as offensive abilites. Punish whenever he fails a and when he throws a in a bad position. Champion Spotlight References Category:Champion strategies